Comments in source code considered harmful

In the file ResourceFontFileLoader.h (offical Windows SDK samples) you can see variable declared as:

static IDWriteFontFileLoader* instance_;

As you see it is a raw pointer here.

And in the file ResourceFontFileLoader.cpp it is initialized with this:

// Smart pointer to singleton instance of the font file loader.
IDWriteFontFileLoader* ResourceFontFileLoader::instance_(
    new(std::nothrow) ResourceFontFileLoader()
    );

Note the comment. “Smart pointer” there is just a good wish. I believe someone reviewed that code and according to the comment all this passed code review. But the code leaks memory. So that comment does quite opposite to what it supposed to do actually – it is not helpful but rather harmful.